Okay, so as I’ve mentioned a few times before on the MPSIMS board, I’ve been in recovery for about eight months now. I don’t want to come off as some sanctimonious blowhard (I know it’s only a t.v. show!) but I happen to be watching a rerun of “Cheers” and I got to thinking about the state of Sam Malone’s sobriety.
It’s mentioned repeatedly in the series that Sam is a “former” alcoholic who bought the bar when he was boozing, and had nothing left but the bar by the time he quit. Sam is shown avoiding drinking, except for the episodes after he initially breaks up with Diane and falls off the wagon. Frasier arrives on the scene to “treat” Sam. But no other mention of his recovery ever seems to be mentioned.
Granted, it’s not the focus of the show, but Sam never mentions belonging to any type of therapy group, A.A. of otherwise, or ever having been a member. In fact, towards the end of the series, Frasier convinces him to join SCA (Sexual Compulsives Anonymous) and Sam reacts with embarrassment and seems naive to the whole process; not the reaction of someone who is familiar with any type of 12 step program.
So just what is he? Is he a dry drunk? Is his womanizing a facet of his addictive behavior? By constantly serving Norm, an obviously problem drinker, is he an enabler?
I know “alcoholism is a self-diagnosed disease.” But since Sam’s a fictional character, I don’t think I’m being invasive by taking his inventory.
I don’t believe in that AA “dry drunk” crap (you can tell you’re attending when you start parrotting the catch-phrases). He’s a sober person. That’s all. Do I have issues with AA? You betchya!
I think Coach was responsible for getting Sam to quit. A 24 hour a day personal addiction therapist. Hence Sam hiring Coach to work at the bar in return as well as to watch over him.
Makes me think of John Rocker. After getting released by the Devil Ray’s AA team, maybe he should try buying a bar, too.
It is someone who is sober but still behaves like an alcoholic with all of the inherent defense mechanisms in place to protect them from seeing reality.
It is not crap, nor is AA, the earlier opinion to the contrary.
Well, I clearly remember one episode (I think it was an early one) where Sam poured himself a drink, and there was a tense moment between he and Carla, but then he dumped the beer out.
Can’t remember why though. I just remember that it was supposed to come across as a dramatic moment, so I’d say it was mentioned more than once, especially in the earlier part of the series.
I remember this episode, too. IIRC, Sam lost his lucky bottle cap and felt he was in danger of falling off the wagon. He poured the beer, and Carla thought he was going to drink it, but instead Sam poured the beer out and kept the cap from that bottle as his new lucky cap.
To insert some points from the source, or one of the sources, on the subject:
If you accept this as a valid syndrome, then you can compare Sam Malone’s behavior to this set of criteria. Personally, I don’t see much of that reflected in the show.
Oddly, it’s this idea that anyone who is sober but doesn’t go to meetings that keeps me from attending the occasional meeting when I feel like it. If people haven’t seen you around for a while, they assume you’ve either been using, or that your life is miserable without the program.
As far as I can see, Sam is an alcoholic that sobered up. No AA or therapy. With all of the problems he seems to create you might classify him as a"dry drunk".
It’s just a TV show, played for laughs, not reality. If Norm was an alcoholic and Sam stopped serving him, he would just find another bar that would. That’s reality.
Some people, see Kahoun’s post, don’t like AA. That’s up to them. In my case, just sobering up didn’t work so I got involved in that AA “shit”. Worked pretty good I guess, I’ve been sober 10+ years and still go to some meetings.
By the way, congratulations on your 8 months! Don’t worry about Sam, pay attention to what your doing.
Sam Malone referred to himself as an alcoholic on at least one occasion. Woody was offering him a drink and Sam said “I can’t drink that stuff, I’m an alcoholic”.
[nitpick] And it was Diane who was with Sam when he “almost” drank. It was the first time she displayed some vulnerability in caring about him. 'Way back when we cared about them.
In the 2nd or 3rd episode of season 3, when Sam wants to quit therapy with Frasier (because he’s recovered) he says something like, “I’m been going to meetings.”
If you wanted preachy AA stuff, you could have watched The John Laroquette Show or NYPD Blue. On those shows, the only thing the characters were about was their alcoholism.
The dramatic scene in which Diane (not Carla) watches Sam about to take a drink climaxes when Sam spins a beer mug and makes it slide around the corner of the bar. He had temporarily lost this skill when he gave away his lucky bottle cap. In that scene, Sam declares that the cap from the beer he just opened is, in fact, his lucky bottle cap and he must have given the “wrong one” to the ballplayer who had borrowed (and subsequently lost) it.
Addiction being a personal thing, I see no reason Sam couldn’t have stopped drinking without the help of AA or any other organized group. By the later seasons, the alcoholism was referred to less and less and I can imagine Sam’s bafflement at being advised to join SCA because who’d-a-thunk scoring with the babes was something to be cured of?
It was established (or at least hinted) that Sam had been a ladies’ man even before starting to play pro ball at age 17 (and thus not finishing high school). As I recall, his first “time” was briefly delayed because he had to cross the street to get to her house and had to wait for the crossing guard (who eventually became his second time).
I’m pretty sure Frasier wasn’t brought in to treat Sam for his addiction per se. Rather, Diane (who had met and fallen in love with Frasier during her stay in an asylum) had brought Frasier to the bar because she thought Sam would need help getting over their relationship, which including slipping back into drinking. Why she thought her current boyfriend would make a good counsellor to her former boyfriend remains a mystery, but I’ll admit the show was greatly improved by bringing in Frasier (and eventually Lilith), giving Cheers a chance for intellectual humour.
